


Vanquished

by codswallop



Category: Schitt's Creek
Genre: Christmas, Fluff, Humor, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Sickfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-03
Updated: 2020-05-03
Packaged: 2021-03-02 02:54:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,594
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23977780
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/codswallop/pseuds/codswallop
Summary: Patrick absolutely refuses to be sick on Christmas Eve.
Relationships: Patrick Brewer/David Rose
Comments: 60
Kudos: 373





	Vanquished

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sonlali](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sonlali/gifts).



“Great,” David said, staring at the thermometer he’d just taken from Patrick’s mouth. “I mean...not great. I mean, fine, this is fine, it just really super sucks with the timing, and yes, I do know I’m being the worst boyfriend in the world right now. I’m sorry. What do you need?”

“Nothing,” Patrick rasped. “Leave the ibuprofen where I can reach it when you go, and a glass of water. I’ll be all right.” He’d known this was coming, ever since he’d felt the first scratchy heat in the back of his throat the day before; he’d known it even more when he’d gone home from work and spent the evening shivering under a blanket on the sofa, unable to get warm. 

“I’ll cancel the thing,” David said, watching him. 

Patrick shook his head against his sweaty pillow and tried to ignore the waves of achy chills that crashed over him again whenever he moved. “You’re not canceling the thing.” They’d been planning the store’s Christmas Eve celebration for weeks: cookie decorating, hot toddies, a few numbers by the Jazzagals followed by candle lighting and caroling. “Everything’s all set up. You can do the thing by yourself.”

“Mmkay, that’s going to be difficult, though, since I’ll be busy taking you to the doctor in Elmdale.”

“I don’t need a doctor,” Patrick said, trying to sound convincingly confident though the hot dull pain in his throat. “Just need to sleep. Go. You should go. I’ve got _germs_ ,” he added cannily. “You don’t want to catch it, do you?” and David took half a step back.

“Maybe I could get Alexis to take you,” David said, covering his nose and mouth with the neck of his sweater. “You really don’t look good, honey.”

“Yes,” said Patrick. “Great plan. Alexis. Do that,” and he turned over and feigned sleep while David tsked and fussed and finally gathered his things to go. Good. Patrick hated being sick; he hated it so much. It was embarrassing, being worried over, and Elmdale was a long, cold drive away. It would be easy, he figured, to talk Alexis into leaving him alone. 

*

But then Alexis texted him twice within half an hour of David’s leaving the apartment, and when he didn’t text back she called, and when he didn’t pick up she actually came to Patrick’s apartment and stood on the doorstep ringing his bell, so it wasn’t as easy as he’d hoped. 

Patrick texted her. **Hi sorry buzzer’s broken, I was asleep, it’s fine you don’t need to take me anywhere sorry you came all this way**

Alexis called him again, and Patrick groaned and finally picked up. “Patrick, oh my god, I thought you were _dead_. Can you come let me in? It’s freezing out here!”

“Not dead,” Patrick croaked. “Just pining for the fjords a little.”

“You’re _what_? Patrick, babe, are you delirious? If you can’t answer the door I can break the lock, I’ve got a hammer and screwdriver in the car, I’ll just...”

“No! I’m fine, I’m fine, I’m just having a nap. Alexis, I’m sorry, you really don’t need to—I’ve just got a cold. I’m sleeping it off. You can go.”

“David said you had a massive fever and you looked like death. Why don’t you want me to come in?”

Patrick sat up to look for the ibuprofen bottle and stifled another groan, then sank back down. His head was swimming, he was too hot, everything hurt, and it was utterly unfair to expect him to participate in conversation at this level. “Don’t want you to catch it,” he tried. “Anyway, David, you know, sometimes he tends to exaggerate a little, don’t know if you’ve ever noticed…”

“He’s hysterical,” Alexis said flatly. 

“Yeah, he’s really keyed up over this event today…” Patrick tried to fumble for the medicine without lifting his head up again and wound up knocking the water glass onto the floor. He smacked a fist weakly into the pillow and somehow managed not to curse out loud. “Maybe if you went and gave him a hand? Tell him I’m feeling a lot better and I’ll call him if I need anything.”

Alexis was silent at the other end of the phone. “Mm _hmm_ ,” she said finally, and Patrick could tell she hadn’t bought it. Alexis really was pretty sharp, the most perceptive of all the Roses, he sometimes thought, for all that she managed to pass herself off as a guileless wisp of harmless fluff. “You know what, Ted’s closing up early today, so I bet he could make a house call this afternoon. I’ll just shoot him a quick text, ’kay?”

“No, no, Alexis, don’t, I’m fine, and also I’m not a _golden retriever_ , so if you could just _not_ do that, I’d really—”

“Yes you are,” she crooned. “You _are_ , you’re like a little sick puppy, or like a...a turtle, actually, hiding away in its little shell, hoping no one will notice—”

“Alexis, seriously. Don’t text Ted.”

“Ted’s really good with turtles, though,” Alexis went on, ignoring him. “And he’s not bad with people, either, you’d be surprised, he completely cured Jocelyn’s psoriasis flare-up last week, and I can’t even count the number of times he’s gotten marbles and stuff out of little kids’ disgusting noses, or…”

“Yeah, I’ll bet,” Patrick said. “You know what? Fine. Send him over.” It wasn’t fine, not in any way, but he badly needed this conversation to end. His entire skull was throbbing. 

“Great.” Alexis sounded relieved. “I’ll text him as soon as I hang up. Sure you don’t need anything while I’m here?”

It was clearly only a reflexive offer; Patrick could already hear her getting back into the car and rummaging in her bag for the keys. “Nope, I’m good,” he lied through his chattering teeth. “Thanks for checking in, Alexis,” and he hung up and pulled the pillow over his head.

*

Patrick wasn’t sure if his phone really rang again less than a minute later, or if he’d somehow managed to haze out for a little while; time was behaving very strangely. He fumbled with the phone and tried to send the call to voicemail, but ended up accidentally answering it instead. He hated everything, especially whoever was on the other end of the line. “Yeah,” he said.

“Why’d you send Alexis over here?” David demanded. “I still haven’t managed to hang half the lights I wanted to put up, and there’s all the cookie decorating stations to set up—oh my god, Alexis, put that _down!_ Right now, before I—and Ray hasn’t even shown up with the extra trees he promised us for the front walk—Alexis, I swear to god, if you touch those again I’m going to—ugh, I thought at least if she were taking you to Elmdale she’d be out of the way doing something _useful_ , instead of—how are you, anyway, what’s going on?”

“I’m good,” Patrick got out, after clearing his throat a couple of times. “Really good. Much better.”

“No, you’re not. You sound terrible. Should I come home? I can still call off this whole nightmare, you know, I think maybe I’d better…”

“No no no no no,” Patrick said, softly, so that the rasp in his voice wouldn’t be so obvious. “Hey. You’ve got this. Have Alexis set up the decorating stations. You work on the lights, and I’ll call Ray.” He blinked, impressed by how normal and rational he was still able to sound with his throat full of steel-tipped hornets and his head at least three times its normal size. 

David made a sound like he hadn’t been entirely taken in by it, though. “Has your temperature gone down at all?”

“Hmm? Yeah, definitely.”

“Down to what? I want a number.”

“I mean,” Patrick hedged. “I haven’t checked it, but I’m almost sure—”

“Uh huh,” said David. “Go take it. I’ll wait. I want a photo of the readout when you do.”

“Okay, wow, that’s—actually, you know what, I’m getting a call from Ted right now and I should take it, Alexis said she’d ask him to stop by, but I will, after I hang up, I promise. Or right after I call Ray. About the trees. Okay?”

David’s next words came through slightly muffled, as though he were holding one hand over the phone. “Alexis! What the hell are you doing with the dragées? Do you have any idea how much those things cost? No more than ten at each station! _Yes_ , I want you to count them!” His voice came back on more clearly. “Okay, fine, Ted’s coming over? That’s, that’s good, actually, maybe he can set you up with some puppy antibiotics, just...try not to look too sexy for him as you languish on your sickbed, ’kay?”

“Oh, that’s...not gonna be a problem,” said Patrick, who had never felt less sexy in his entire life. “Let me just take this before he goes to voicemail, okay? I’ll call you back.”

“Hey!” Ted cried out at the other end of the phone, much, much too loudly and cheerily. “Thought you weren’t going to pick up. Alexis left me a really confusing message earlier about a sick turtle needing a house call? Where’d you get a turtle this time of year?”

Patrick devoutly wished that he’d never moved to Schitt’s Creek, or that everyone in it would at least have the decency to leave him alone to die. “I’m the turtle,” he said bleakly. “Came down with a bug last night. But I _do not_ need a house call, thanks. I think I’ll pull through, if I can just get a little rest around here.”

“Aw, you sound terrible,” Ted said, still much too cheerfully. “Fever, too? Could be strep. You know I don’t actually give out medications to humans, no matter what Alexis thinks—”

“I know, I know, and I really don’t want—”

“But I’m about to close up shop for the day, so I can stop by and at least take a look at you, see if it seems like you need to make the trek to Elmdale tonight or wait it out till after the holiday. I’ll stop by in fifteen, okay? Need anything from the store, or the cafe?”

“Nope,” Patrick gritted out. “Sure. See you.” Sleep. He needed sleep. Peace and quiet and sleep. He hung up on Ted, and the phone buzzed again instantly in his hand. “Oh my GOD,” Patrick cried in a strangled shout, and clutched his throat in agony. “What!” he snarled into the phone.

“Patrick!” Ray was utterly unfazed by the less than warm greeting. “I’m so glad I caught you. I have excellent news!”

“The town burned down? Christmas is canceled?”

Ray laughed immoderately, so loudly that Patrick had to hold the phone away from his ear. “Patrick, you’re too much! I miss your sense of humour. No, but actually, I just had a last-minute order for a dozen trees for that community theatre in Elm Ridge, you know, the one with the annual interactive holiday staging of Macbeth? The director decided that their Birnam Wood is looking a bit thin, and guess who they called on to supply the difference?”

“Oh,” said Patrick, and put the back of his wrist to his forehead; was he hallucinating? “So, then…”

“Me!” Ray cried. “They called me! But don’t worry, I still have plenty of surplus trees left for David’s event tonight. The only trouble is that I won’t be able to deliver them myself; I’m leaving for Elm Ridge almost this minute.”

“Oh,” Patrick said again, struggling to keep up. “That’s, okay? Um.”

“But I have a perfect alternative solution,” Ray plowed on, relentless. “Guess who has a pickup truck and would love to be helpful to you in your hour of need? Or to David, at least?”

“Oh,” Patrick said for a third time. “Ray, no, not—”

“Ronnie!” Ray exulted. “Give her a call. I’m sure she’ll be perfectly happy to pick up the trees and deliver them to the store. If necessary, just mention to her that I’ll give her one of the bottles of prosecco that David promised me in exchange for the favour…”

“He did _what?”_

“Got to dash,” Ray said quickly. “Birnam Wood to Dunsinane! Merry Christmas! Ciao!”

Patrick went limp. He couldn’t call Ronnie, even if he’d wanted to. David could do without the trees, surely. He shut his eyes, turned the problem over in his spinning brain for a minute or two, and then moaned and picked up his phone again. 

“Ray texted me already,” Ronnie said, in lieu of a greeting. “I want three things understood.”

“Season’s greetings to you, too,” Patrick mumbled. “Hi, Ronnie.”

“Uh huh. One: I’m doing this for David. Two: No pleasantries. Two bottles of prosecco and a large body milk is all the thanks I need. Three: Any tree-lifting will be done by you, and you alone. I’ll pick you up in five.” She hung up without waiting for his response.

“Okay,” Patrick said. “Okay. Great. Yeah,” and hauled himself upright. He could do this. Absolutely. At any rate, it would be a perfect way to avoid the humiliation of a house call from Ted. Ronnie, at least, was the one person he could count on to be utterly devoid of tiresome sympathy or concern.

*

“Good lord,” said Ronnie, rolling down her window to scowl at him as she pulled up in front of Patrick’s apartment building. “You look like death warmed over. What’s the matter with you?”

“It’s fine, I’m fine,” Patrick said dully, shivering. “Thanks, but I really don’t need—”

“Not what I meant. I mean what’s the _matter_ with you—is it catching? I’ve got a sweet solo to sing tonight, and a hot date afterward. Don’t need any of that yucking it up.” She gave Patrick a disgusted once-over. “You’re the colour of mouldy cheese. You can ride in the back. Hop in.”

Patrick had to laugh, although it hurt his throat like knives and he bent double, coughing, gasping in the cold wind to try to get his breath back. “Thanks, Ronnie,” he managed finally. “Never change. Please.”

“I’m beginning to reconsider this whole deal,” she told him. “Are you sure about this?”

Patrick nodded, still unable to speak, and climbed into the back of the truck, and after another suspicious glare back at him and a head-shaking sigh, Ronnie drove. The wind was bitter and whip-sharp, but he huddled down in the truck bed and breathed into his scarf as best he could. It wasn’t far to Ray’s, he told himself. And it was weirdly peaceful, being driven along under the open grey skies. He wondered if it might snow. He wondered how David was getting along with the event setup, and whether he’d gotten past the nervous freakout stage yet. He pictured himself arriving at the store with the trees, Birnam Wood to Dunsinane, and wondered who he’d be if David were Macbeth. Banquo? Lady Macbeth? “Screw your courage to the sticking place, and we’ll not fail,” he murmured dreamily; the wind seemed to have died down, and he wasn’t cold anymore.

“Jesus god, Brewer,” Ronnie said, and he blinked to find himself still in the bed of her truck, no longer in motion. “You really do look like death. What are you muttering about?”

“Nothing, nothing,” Patrick assured her, shaking himself back to reality, and he jumped down from the truck bed. He had to steady himself for a few moments, head whirling, but then the world settled again. “I’m okay,” he said, to himself as much as to Ronnie. “Really.”

“You’re as sick as a dog,” Ronnie told him. “Get in the cab. I’ll get the trees. Those ones by the front of the lot, with the white tape on them? Scrawny old things, anyway.”

Patrick helped, though, and the two of them made short work of getting the four (admittedly scrawny) trees into the truck bed. He really did feel much better. Not cold at all. He’d bring the trees, and help set them up on the walkway up to the Apothecary all spangled with white lights, just like they’d planned, and David would be pleased and relieved, and Christmas would be perfect. 

“Cab,” Ronnie told him, when they’d finished and he started to climb into the back of the truck again. “I’m not delivering your corpse along with these things. Is David aware of the state you’re in, running around like this?”

“No, no, it’s fine, I like the back, the wind feels good, actually,” Patrick protested.

“I’ll bet,” said Ronnie, but she wouldn’t start the truck until he gave up and climbed into the passenger seat. Once inside, he put his head down against the window and instantly slid into a hazy doze again. Pine branches, white lights, sticky sap on his hands, sticky blood, stifling heat. They couldn’t drive the trees to David; he’d be fulfilling the prophecy, it would mean death. He tried to tell Ronnie they should turn around, but when he finally fought his way to the surface again and lifted his head to speak, she was gone. 

She really was gone. There was no one in the driver’s seat. Patrick shook his head, disbelieving, frightened and queasy and _hot_ —where was he? Had Ronnie ever been there at all? Was he still in bed, dreaming this whole thing, or—

“Hey. Patrick.” A tapping next to his head almost made him jump out of his skin, and he cried out. “Patrick, it’s me. Can you unlock the door?” Patrick stared uncomprehendingly through the truck window at David’s worried face. “Okay, never mind, I’ll come around,” David said, and a moment later he was opening the driver’s side door and sliding across the long bench seat, cupping Patrick’s face in his hands, his beautiful strong cool hands, and pressing his lips to Patrick’s forehead. 

“We brought you trees,” Patrick said, remembering. “I’m sorry.”

“Yeah, I saw that,” David said, very softly. “Ted’s helping Ronnie unload them, and then she’s gonna drive us to the medical centre. You are way, way too hot, honey.”

“No, but there’s, you’ve got to do the thing, though,” Patrick tried to explain.

“Alexis can do the thing,” David told him. 

“She’ll use up all the dragées and she won’t know how to do the lights the way you like them—no, don’t touch my hands, they’re all bloody—”

“They are?” David frowned and picked up Patrick’s hands, turning them over and leaning in close to inspect him. “Tree sap,” he said, and kissed Patrick’s right palm, and then the left one. “How about if you take a nap, and I’ll wake you up when we get to Elmdale,” David suggested, drawing Patrick’s head down onto his shoulder, and Patrick relented, finally; it suddenly seemed like the best idea he’d heard all day.

*

He didn’t wake up when they got to Elmdale, not that he remembered, anyway, although according to Ronnie later on he’d had all _kinds_ of things to say, most of them in blank verse. He didn’t wake up to remember it until very early the next morning, when he found himself in a hospital bed, gowned and IV’d, and David sleeping curled in a disheveled heap on the weird uncomfortable-looking recliner chair on the other side of the room. 

“Merry Christmas,” Patrick said, in a quiet experimental croak; his throat was still awful. David stirred and groaned and flung out an arm, and then gave an _oh_ and sat up swiftly.

“Hi,” he said. “Are you awake? Hi. You look better.”

“I wrecked it,” Patrick whispered mournfully. “I wrecked Christmas.”

“I hate Christmas,” David told him, and got up and climbed into the bed with him. “Hey, look at you, you’re not on fire anymore. They couldn’t get your temperature to go down last night; it was kind of scary.”

“I’m sorry,” Patrick said, feeling completely wretched in every way.

“Mmm, and I think you acted out, like, _all_ of Macbeth, every part, every line; it was like being trapped in a living nightmare with Alan Cumming. Or my mother.” David shuddered elaborately, then looked up at Patrick’s face, and his expression went soft. “Hey,” he said. “It’s okay. You’re okay. You’ve got a really bad strep throat, that’s all, and they’re gonna let me take you home as soon as your fever’s under control. I wasn’t _that_ scared.” 

“You weren’t, huh?”

“Mm- _mm_ ,” David said, in that emphatic way that meant he was obviously lying. “Also? Everyone feels really, really sorry for both of us right now, and Alexis says the holiday event was a smash success and she sold out half our stock last night, so, good job there. And Ronnie feels so guilty about making you ride in the truck bed that I think I can get her to put in that sink we’ve been wanting in the stockroom for free. Or at cost, anyway.”

“Christmas miracle,” Patrick said, and he pulled David closer, wishing they were at home in their own bed. “I’m still sorry.” 

“Best Christmas morning ever,” David insisted, kissing him and then settling himself neatly into that spot beneath Patrick’s shoulder where he fit so perfectly, with a sigh that sounded like utter contentment. He really meant it, too, Patrick thought, and he wasn’t sure if that was the saddest or the happiest thing he’d ever heard, but anyway, he hoped, it could only get better from here.


End file.
